I would make certain the 90 dollar an hour people that you like are not making anything on what they buy for you in terms of furniture and the like.Most decorators make money on your new flooring,window coverings,furniture,etc.They should not make anything if you are paying them 90 bucks an hour. Y...

We are decorating/furnishing a new house and obtained quotes from 4 interior designers/decorators: 1. The company we liked best quoted us 54 hours of work x $90 per hour for a total of $4,860 2. Our second favorite company quoted us 20-25 hours of work for $225 per hour, so a total of $4,500-5,625 ...

Why do you need decorators? We've lived here a year, still have little furniture, and the walls are bare. We work about 120-150 hours a week between the two of us and are exhausted by the time we come home. Even finding time to be home for a 2-4 hour window for furniture delivery is very difficult ...

freedom... I offer this to you as a life certified public purchasing professional officer (CPPO). Advise each of the companies they are under consideration and ask them to submit a last and final offer on their original proposal by a certain date/time. From that last and final feel free to negotiat...

Let me see - their quote was more detailed and they said it would take more time. Sounds consistent. A detailed, careful company. I would not ask them to do it in fewer hours, that is asking them to cut corners and they do not seem like that kind of firm. They may well take it as an insult. I would...

We are decorating/furnishing a new house and obtained quotes from 4 interior designers/decorators: 1. The company we liked best quoted us 54 hours of work x $90 per hour for a total of $4,860 2. Our second favorite company quoted us 20-25 hours of work for $225 per hour, so a total of $4,500-5,625 3...

Thank you for the replies! I have to find a system that supports 12 zones, and basically want to "set it and forget it." Will check out those mentioned above. The Rachio can handle up to 16 zones (I have 13 zones in my system). Also, the second generation has manual controls on the front of the uni...

Would it be better to roll it into another 401k? If you roll it into an IRA then you will not be able to make contributions to Roth IRA (or backdoor Roth IRA) without avoiding the pro-rata rule. If you don't have another 401k, you could leave there for awhile, do some 1099 or other side work to set ...

It seems anytime I have to adjust the sprinkler system is when I don't want to -- when it's raining and I get soaking wet. Sometimes I'm not home when it's raining and cannot adjust my standard system for rain delays. Water is expensive in SoCal, so I think a smart sprinkler would pay for itself in ...

No fed or state tax if you live in CA. Some say the yield for the LT fund is not compensated for enough compared with the Intermed fund, but I'm a relative newbie so might want some of the more experienced BH to chime in. Some folks say to not concentrate too much risk in one state: I've been splitt...

Thank you so much for the replies! I appreciate the followup questions for the HVAC companies. Also greatly appreciate the personal experiences and info from Consumer Reports. The company with Trane is a better price quote, they have great reviews and they seem more thorough, so we'll probably go wi...

My Trane 16i died less than a year after it was installed. A common flaw with that model I later learned. I'll buy something else next time. Yikes, I just read the warranty for the Trane quote: Warranty: 6 year unit replacement, 12 Year functional parts, 12 Year on Compressor I tried looking at Con...

I obtained quotes for installing central AC for our house (2,400 sq ft one-level). Our area is temperate, so we would only use AC about 3-4 months out of the year and just during mid to late afternoon. All three companies recommended a 5-ton condenser. But some quoted 14 SEER and others 16 SEER. The...

I have zero debt (other than a mortgage), an emergency fund, and would like to aim for 7-8% returns each year with index funds. In addition to my 401K (maxed out each year), I started a Vanguard account with the following funds: -Vanguard Total Stock Market Index Fund (VTSMX) -Vanguard Total Intern...

So much for the meeting. I was called and notified there will be no raise. The person on the phone said they pushed for me and felt I really deserved a raise but that the hospital administration said they lost a lot of money this year and cannot give raises.

OP - Interview. Even if you don't get a new job, you will have a good sense of exactly what the market will pay for someone of precisely your skillset. This will give you a baseline to understand your value to your current employer. However, do not use this as direct leverage with your employer - w...

Different profession, but do you know (or have any idea) why your compensation is low? It can often be helpful, when planning a strategy for increased compensation, to have an understanding of why you are being compensated as you are. I was a new hire a few years back, so they hired me for less bac...

are you salaried or paid on production? In general, highly productive docs should look for production based compensation. We are a production based comp model. As a result, most everyone we hire is pretty productive. Sometimes we make a mistake and hire less productive docs. They don't tend to stic...

PS - Several of my colleagues have RVUs much lower -- below the national average. If I were to work at the same level as my colleagues they might have to hire another physician. But I'm not sure that I should bring that up in the meeting.

Are you on a partner track or has the group just hired you as an employee? If so I'd do nothing but since you didn't indicate it a partner track seems unlikely. Are you hoping the group offers you a partnership? I think you've got a great case but they've got no incentive to give you a raise since ...

Do you have a way to walk away if they refuse. Sounds like you are relatively underpaid. Have seen many MDs accept far less than they generate. It can go many different ways. One thing is for sure, if you don't ask they are unlikely to call you in and say, 'hey, take this money you earned it!' I ha...

Thank you for all of the great advice! No, we are not looking to impress anyone. If we wanted to impress the neighbors we'd drive fancy cars, wear fancy clothes etc. This mainly came up because we have lived in the house awhile now, it is still unfurnished due to limited time and other factors, and ...

My wRVUs are consistently 90th to 95th percentile however my pay is about median to 60th percentile for my specialty. I have been at the group for about 5 years, W2 employee, and my pay is the lowest in the group as far as I can gather from discussion with others in the group. I have scheduled a mee...

We purchased a house in the past year and still have a lot of furnishing to do. My spouse wants to hire an interior designer, but it seems pretty simple to just sift through magazines and copy the same layout for our house. Here are her thoughts: 1. Interior designer (ID) would do a better job than ...

Spouse had $59,913 in tIRA at Vanguard for 2015. This contained money from a prior employer 401k (38,413) and annual max post-tax tIRA contributions (5k in 2012, 5.5k in 2013, 5.5k in 2014, and 5.5k in 2015) for a total of 21,500 post-tax tIRA contributions. She rolled over $38,413 to her current em...

It's highly unlikely to be worth refinancing for such a small reduction in the rate. There are closing costs and expenses involved in processing a new mortgage, typically in the range of 1% to 2% or more of the balance of the loan. Thank you for the detailed reply! I did the math and looks as thoug...

I noticed rates dropped last week. We have 30-year fixed jumbo at 3.625% which is pretty good, but a cursory search shows a few places offering 3.5% 30-year fixed jumbo (credit scores 770, 780). Last time we were able to get rates lower than the cursory search, so we might be able to get 3.4% maybe...

It's highly unlikely to be worth refinancing for such a small reduction in the rate. There are closing costs and expenses involved in processing a new mortgage, typically in the range of 1% to 2% or more of the balance of the loan. You'll either have to pay those out of pocket or roll them into the...

I noticed rates dropped last week. We have 30-year fixed jumbo at 3.625% which is pretty good, but a cursory search shows a few places offering 3.5% 30-year fixed jumbo (credit scores 770, 780). Last time we were able to get rates lower than the cursory search, so we might be able to get 3.4% maybe...

This method is called overbalancing. Like a riskier version of rebalancing. I had a discussion about this 6 months ago - see here for more details. https://www.bogleheads.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=167252&hilit=rebalance Also the Finance Buff had a nice article about it here: http://thefinanceb...

If the market drops 45%, it's fair to say many people will lose their jobs. Could you be one of those people, right after you switch to 90/10? Will 10% in bonds be enough to feed your family and pay your mortgage?[/quote] We both work. If I lost my job we could make some minor lifestyle changes and...

I noticed rates dropped last week. We have 30-year fixed jumbo at 3.625% which is pretty good, but a cursory search shows a few places offering 3.5% 30-year fixed jumbo (credit scores 770, 780). Last time we were able to get rates lower than the cursory search, so we might be able to get 3.4% maybe ...

This method is called overbalancing. Like a riskier version of rebalancing. I had a discussion about this 6 months ago - see here for more details. https://www.bogleheads.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=167252&hilit=rebalance Also the Finance Buff had a nice article about it here: http://thefinanceb...